The sources of slavery in the Malayan countries are chiefly piracy at sea, captivity in war, manstealing along the coast, and the penalties enacted in the Malayan law respecting debts and sundry misdemeanors. The surviving crews of vessels which fall into the hands of the pirates are generally disposed of by sale at the first market. The captives taken in the constant wars which the Malayan chieftains carry on against each other, are generally employed in domestic occupations, tending cattle, and cultivating the ground, where there is no opportunity of bringing them to market. This, however, is seldom the case, since such numbers are constantly required by the Arabs and Chinese traders, and heretofore by the Dutch. Many of the Arab trading vessels are almost exclusively navigated by the slaves of the owner; and in their progress from island to island, they find little difficulty in recruiting their crew, by receiving presents of slaves, or if that should fail, by kidnapping the unfortunate natives. This forms a strong argument against admitting the unrestricted range of the islands to either Chinese or Arab traders; for while this is permitted, the abolition of the system of kidnapping would be absolutely impossible. The pagan tribes in the vicinity of the Mahometans, such as those on _Báli_, and some of the tribes of Celebes, the _Harafúras_, the black _Papúas_ or oriental negroes, the original inhabitants of _Hálamahíra_, _Coram_, and other easterly nations, are in a great measure the victims of the kidnapping system, and being infidels are considered as fair booty. Nothing has tended more decidedly to the deterioration of the Malayan character, than the want of a well defined and generally acknowledged system of law and commercial regulation. The Malayan nations had, in general, made considerable progress in civilization, before the introduction of the Mahometan religion among them: they had, accordingly, regular institutions of their own, some of which were probably of considerable antiquity, derived from the continent of India, and consequently radically different from those of the Arabs. Some difficulty appears to have occurred in adapting these institutions to the general tenor of the Mahometan law, and many anomalous ones appear accordingly to have sprung up in different states. These occur in every part of jurisprudence, whether commercial, civil, or criminal, and are recited in the _Undang úndang_ and _Adat Maláyu_, which are the systems of national law among the _Maláyus_. They vary considerably from each other in different states, and still more from the generally acknowledged principle of Mahometan law, as received by the Arabs. Hence there is, in almost every state, a constant struggle between the adherents of the old Malayan usages and the _Hájis_, together with other religious persons, who are desirous of introducing the laws of the Arabs, in order to increase their own importance.